... is access to ITER while conducting experiments on neutron capture to produce fissionables, including weapons grade. France is likely to scream bloody murder sooner or later when the US does this (because they can; because they want to world to see them supporting non-weapons based nuclear work; because they want to be seen standing up to the World Bully; because it could encroach on their own high neutron producing commercial reactor business; etc.). While the people of Japan are equally as likely to find displeasure in what amounts to nuclear weapons research being conducted on their soil, the Japanese government and social structure will keep the noise level much lower than would occur in France. The US could get booted from France (it happened to NATO), but not from Japan.
Although fusion is relatively "clean", ITER is still a neutron heavy design (http://wsx.lanl.gov/Publications/neut-activate.pd f). If the US were interested in energy production, rather than neutron production, they could have pursued thorium based fission reactors (http://www.americanscientist.org/template/AssetDe tail/assetid/25710/page/2). They're not as clean as fusion, but cleaner than heavy uranium and plutonium reactors. They're not externally neutron efficient, because they use their neutrons "breeding" thorium 232 into uranium 233, the actual fuel for the reaction. Thorium reactors can be built as neutron sources, but that's hanging a bag on the design; the more efficient designs don't need or incorporate that because they use the neutrons themselves.
"Solar radiation is measured by seeing how much the side of a black plate warms up when exposed to the sun, compared with its flip side, which is shaded. It's a relatively crude device, and we have no way of proving how accurate measurements made 30 years ago really are. "To detect temporal changes you must have very good data otherwise you're just analysing the difference between data retrieval systems," says Ohmura."
Measurement is data COLLECTION, not RETRIEVAL.
Does this bonehead seriously believe there's some sort of magical barrier between different forms of data collection?
1. Set up both old and new devices and take measurements. Compare results. If there's a systematic difference, apply the approriate correction factor to the old data, OR
2. USE THE OLD DEVICE.
The former is what any decent scientist would do when confronted with new technology, without waiting for some situation to occur which would call his measurements into question. The latter is always possible by going to the undergraduate labs and taking back the old stuff you've given them to learn with. If the old stuff isn't available any more, have the undergrads build some. They'd learn more from that than from using your old junk anyway.
thoolihan sez: "Technology could have solved this problem a better way."
If it could have, it would have. We've had the technology all along. Nothing tried worked, and many things considered were not even tried because it was obvious they wouldn't work either.
The problem is not technical, it's social. It requires a social solution. However, this law is not it.
One silver lining to this law though: it requires a valid, working opt-out address. When the flood of opt-out message blow the server off the net, that address will no longer be working, and the spammer will be in violation.
Remember, kids, opt-out early, and opt-out often. If it doesn't work, scream bloody murder. As weak as it is, this law gives you a voice. Use it. When it fails miserably, then maybe we'll get a better law.
...could be had by examining the pages for a year's worth of Wired, and at the end of the year, trying to find those things in a store. Wired has made a bad habit of advertising vaporware for companies that want to test the market and see how many inquiries they get. Of course, Wired never comes out and tells you such-and-such isn't really being made and sold. They write them all up as if they exist.
You'd think that'd be strange behavior for a magazine that carries an annual vaporware contest, but hey, it's Wired. They only have to be cool, not sensical.
Looks like SUn is pushing for exactly this. On Monday they announce a deal with the UK government to supply Linux Enterprise servers and Java Desktop Linux users' systems.
AND, they're announcing a deal with the Chinese software consortium CSSC, which could amount to from 0.5 to 1.0 million desktops a year.
With support now for OO, and with their Java Desktop + Suse Linux (Due out Dec. 12) coming with tech support (including "migration support")they might JUST have a combination that can best M$, and actually compete for the average user's desktop. That is, if the initial install is at least as easy as Windows. I'll let you know next week.
This joke about a joke was told to me by a social psychologist who specializes in the psychology of humor.
The traveling salesman's car breaks down at night on a country road. He walks to the nearest farm, knocks on the door says "May car broke down. Can you give me a ride into town?"
The farmer says "Not tonight, but I can take you in the morning. You can stay in my guest house. No one else is there. You can lock the doors, and no one will bother you, guaranteed."
The salesman turns around and starts to walk away. The farmer says "Hey! Where are you going?"
I've tested this one in a stand-up routine. The average Joe/Jane rarely gets it. Anyone who knows lab-working scientists gets it right away.
A famous scientist was downtown, shopping with his wife, and clearly not enjoying it. She said "I'm going to shop for some shoes. You can go to the bookstore to browse. I'll meet you in front of the bookstore in an hour," and goes off.
The scientist goes into the bookstore. Soon after, a beautiful young coed comes in, eyes the scientist, and starts to make moves on him. He falls for the ploy, and ends up at her place, doing the nasty.
Three hours later, he realizes he's late, and rushes off back to the bookstore. There he finds his wife waiting, arms crossed, tapping her toe angrily.
Overcome with remorse he tells her what happened, admitting everything, and apologizing profusely.
She listens to his speech, and when he's done, shakes her finger at him and yells "Don't lie to me! You were at the lab!"
As noted elsewhere, nobody, including Bill Gates, ever said anything about 640K being enough.
The source of the quote was Steve Jobs, questioning Steve Wozniak's suggestion to build the "Language Card", the 16K memory card that took the Apple II/II Plus from 48K to 64K.
Jobs' actual words were, "Why would anyone ever need more than 48K?" Not 64K, as assumed by the first misquoters, based on the maximum direct addressability of 8 bit processors, and not 640K as assumed by those who decided to misattribute the quote altogether.
Jobs was always questioning Woz's technically oriented decisions, and frequently making the opposite decision when he had the power to do so. For example, he argued that there was no reason to build color into the Apple II. Woz did it anyway. When Jobs got the chance to make a similar decision, he went against Woz's reasoning, and even against the advice of others under him when making them. Hence, the original Macs, and several versions after, were strictly monochrome.
I'd like to think Jobs learned his lesson after ignoring someone's advice not to hire "some soda pop selling suit" and losing control of his company for 10 years. But I could be wrong.
Anyway, that's what I recall from my old "SoftTalk" and "The Road Apple" days.
Score Meaning of the number of bullets
5 bullets -- Two or more Category A Experiments (Hypothesis Testing) support the guideline.
4 bullets -- One Category A Experiment (Hypothesis Testing) supports the guideline.
3 bullets* -- Two or more Category B Studies (Observational Evaluation/ Performance-Based Usability Tests) support the guideline.
2 bullets* -- One Category B Study (Observational Evaluation/ Performance-Based Usability Tests) supports the guideline.
1 bullet* -- One or more Category C Observations (Expert/Opinions), and no other supporting evidence, supports the guideline.
0 bullets** -- No evidence supports the guideline. The guideline may be routinely implemented in many Web sites as standard practice without any supporting evidence."...they score an average of exactly 2.5 on their support. I'm not impressed.
Furthermore, they have zero scores of 5; not a one of their "experiments" was replicated. And they have 14 scores of 4. If success were considered the traditional statistical significance value of p.05 (accepting a 5% chance any given result is a false positive), they have a cumulative probability of 93% that at least one of their "4" scores is incorrect.
Finally, out of 150 measures, they have 11 scores of "1", meaning "expert opinion". Without a way to tell whether these opinions might be biased by something like potential gain from a commercial publication on the subject, these would be all useless. However, they do provide such evidence. Many of these "opinions" are from published books, for which the author no doubt gets paid. While the author may indeed be an expert, and his/her opinion very probably good and correct, these data are potentially biased to the point that they are NOT EVIDENCE.
This sort of nonsense is what Samuel Clemens was talking about when he said "Lies, damn lies, and statistics".
I suppose the discussion here could have taken the path of "the natural evolution of language", which usually completely fails to conform to any particular set of lingustic rules. In fact such evolution may only be visible *because* it violates the rules.
Instead, everyone seems to intend to stick to the traditional line (and be aware this selfsame argument is over 20 years old) and base their positions on Appleal to Authority. In terms of logic, this is a flaw. In terms of argumentation, it's a constant. It invariably results in people appealing to dictionaries, as though they were prescriptive. They're not: they're descriptive. They tell only how people use language, not how they *should* use it. (OK, some do that, but mostly to satisfy elementary school grammar teachers, who are entirely wrong when it comes to this). At least none I've seen appealed to "Websters'", which is a marketing label in and of itself in no way any more authoritative than Uncle Bubba's Down Home Dictionary, Almanac and Sporting Goods Catalog.
So here's my contribution: I've contacted Fred COhen, author of the 1983 virus paper, and asked his opinion. Here's his response, Date: Fri, 28 Nov 2003 09:57:13 -0800 (PST):
"I think that this discussion was held at great length in the late 1980s. "viruses" is of course an acceptable spelling and legitimate according to most dictionaries, while "virii" is another less used but perfectly acceptable plural form as far as I am aware. The quesiton of which is preferred is a matter of public opinion rather than scientific reconning."
Now, I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt, and credit him with using "reconning" (as as slang verb form of "reconnaissance", meaning observation) as an accurate as well as homonymous replacement for "reckoning" (i.e., "figuring out"). After all, if it's "scientific", it's more reconning than reckoning.
I've also asked Rick Skrenta, author of the Apple II Elk Cloner virus, which predates Cohen's paper by over a year, the same question. If he answers, I'll add it.
I absolutely do not expect this all to slow the endless and circular arguments regarding "virii" one iota. But at least I've given you something to think about, and at least put a little effort into adding something new. Speaking of, here's something else:
Despite the media effusion concerning the 20th anniversary of his paper, Cohen says that only one other party contacted him in regards to the subject. Had they done so, they might have learned that although Cohen now resides and teaches at the University of California-San Francisco, he still teaches computer forensics at the University of New Haven (where he was when he wrote the paper) via "distance teaching".
It covers precisely the range and points that were widely accepted by the end of the conference. And yes, that means it ended poorly.
A few of us tried to make the point that filtering done at the receiving end does nothing to stop the wasted bandwidth. Furthermore, carrying that extra bandwidth, whether a given user ever sees it or not, means greater equipment purchase, maintanence and replacement costs, and those costs are passed along to the consumer.
Unfortunately even some of the supposedly anti-spam community got suckered into accepting "labeling" and "the false positive problem" and other nonsense. I think they were trying to be fair to the few truly ethical online marketing folks, but in so doing forgot to consider the actual numbers related to the issues, and lost track of perspective.
My hero of the conference was Commisioner Swindell, the older ex-Marine gentleman who found himself seperating a spammer's lawyer and his intended target it a near brawl. I spoke with him, and he was one of the few there who maintained the recognition that the problem is far greater than the stuff that annoys people when they find it in their inbox; an equal problem is that part of their bill due to spam whether they receive it nor not.
A suitable response to this law would be for everyone (in the US at least) to forward any spam they receive to the inboxes of the boneheads who initiated and supported this law, with the statement "IT AIN'T WORKING!"
"Nuke 'em from orbit. It's the only way to be sure." -- Lt. Ripley
I've been thinking a lot about widespread Linux desktop installations lately. I almost posted an Ask Slashdot about it yesterday.
You want to see widespread Linux desktop installation? "Which desktop" is precisely the wrong kind of question to be asking. That information is superfluous to both the IT droids who'll have to support it, and the cubical dwellers who'll have to live with it.
To get ANY Linux out there in significant numbers, you need to best Microsoft. The system would need to restrict itself to asking and giving what Microsoft does now. All the distros I've tried give way too much choice. Choice is great from hackers. It's pure terror in the form of tough questions for the MSmasses.
Install easy, with a minimum of user input. Give what Windows does: desktop, "office" suite, email, web, and hidden below the surface unless needed, the ability to run server or client based specialty software in a window that looks and acts like all the others.
It'd need to automagically recognize any networking being offered it and configure itself to that. When it did ask questions, they should be "What is your internet address going to be? (This is a collection of up to 12 numbers with periods between them; if you don't know, ask your system operator)", NOT "Input your IP dotted quad".
Users don't WANT to know how cool it is, much less which of the possible configurations is cooler. They want transparent instant operability. They couldn't care less if their desktop were the black, lavender and orange Star Trek LCARS screen, as long as they can do their job and not have to readjust to a new configuration of they switch seats or machines.
Give them that, for less than MS, say $100 per machine INCLUDING phone tech support (something like Sun is planning with its Java Desktop plus presumably Suse), and it'll look as inviting as MS.
Make it more stable, and easier to recover from crashes (no more "Well, we'll just have to reinstall the operating system") and it'll be more inviting than MS.
Send out 10,000 of them free to the top companies' IT people, invite them to install it and try it out on some unclued cubical dwellers machines, and wait for the results. After enough time has passed, contact those companies CIO and ask how well it worked, and if they'd like to buy. They'll ask the IT people, and your answer will be assured if the distro was done right.
Oh yeah, and make it be not bloatware, and use that as a selling point. For an example, see muLinux, the distro that fits (and RUNS) on 5 floppies. A complete install, including all docs and archives of the install files, took 30 MB on my machine. Oh yeah, it had a GUI. I don't recall which. I didn't care then, and I don't now, because all I cared about was whether it worked or not. It did.
MS software is obviously not better than Linux. Something else about MS must be. Find it, and best them. Even if that means turning your favorite distro into Linux for Dummies, because it's dummies who sit behind most of the machines out there.
And if it's still a concern that a given distro/desktop would still require more maintanence, because the dummy in front of it can't do squat, then your distro/desktop is not ready for Cubical Heaven/Hell Prime Time. The successful (as in widely deployed) Linux desktop user system will be the one that decides "OK, that's enough hacking. It's time to go to work."
"True artists ship." -- Steve Jobs to the original Mac design team.
drsmithy sez: "Can any of you USians tell me why you don't use the word "spat" ?"
That which is "correct" is often viewed as "old fashioned", and that is anathema to what passes for culture in American society. We know full well "spat" is correct: that's why.
And then he sez: "(And while you're at it, could you tell me why you say "petting the cat" instead of "patting the cat".)"
We use both. petting == stroking; parallel to surface patting == tapping; perpendicual to surface But cats are most often stroked, not tapped, hence the seeming propensity of "petting".
I am well aware that I have a hooter in my bonnet. Unfortunately, when I say that in American, it means I have a tit under my hat, rather than a horn under the hood of my car. I'm not quite sure exactly what point that makes, but it makes me laugh like hell.
"Well, golly, Mr. ARIA, I guess we could do that. But you see, it'd take an awful lot of people watching what happens, and a lot of computers and software for them to do their jobs. That's going to run into a lot of money. So what say we ask the government to help us get this paid for? We'll was them to pass a bill for a new tax. Since it's to protect music, it just makes sense that it's a tax on music. We figure of you charge, say, 40% on top of the cost of a CD, that should cover it. You pass that along to us, and we'll do our best.
Mr. ARIA? Where you going? Mr. ARIA, don't you want to catch all them bad song stealing people out there?
fb4f sez: 'Paraphrasing the article, a Spanish company called Polyphonic HMI has made a business out of analyzing song submissions and predicting their "hitability".'
Figure: Despite the fact that subliminal advertising is 99% bogus, and Freud's thanatos theory is 101% bogus, alcohol and tobacco companies have been using the combination of the two, in the form of death imagery airbrushed into their ads, for over 30 years. They have no evidence it works, but JUST IN CASE they can grab another tenth of percentage point of market share, they keep paying artists thousands of dollars to do this.
The same will apply here. Record publishers will pay money just in case they can make more money, no matter how ridiculous the premise.
This algorithm could actually produce enough positives to convince people it works, if there were sufficient sampling of the population on what it is they like about a sufficient sampling of songs.
It will, however, produce a lot of false negatives when its tried on those songs which don't fit the pop definitions. Songs like "Luftballoon" and "The Music Box Song" were pop hits because they were almost meme-like catchy. Johnny Cash's "Boy Named Sue" was a pop hit despite being based in country rather than pop. And, the algorithm will completely miss anything truly innovative. There would be lots of false negatives, and of course as negatives they'd be unlikely to be reviewed later as evidence the proces was broken. There would probably be very few false positives, and that too would appear to support the algorithm (beacuse people trying to maximize income are highly unlikely to grasp the statistical concepts of alpha level, beta level, and power).
And perhaps this could be a good thing. If the RIAA crowd started relying on such Artificial Stupidity (what else can you call something that picks the winners that these losers sell), then the truly innovative will be forced to operate under a different paradigm. Maybe something like MP3.com/Magnatunes, etc. Maybe self-produced and distributed via the net, bypasing the record companies altogether. Maybe becoming the seed of an as yet unthought of social art system that will fill the gap when the RIAA finally eats itself.
On the other hand, given sufficient sampling of the population, and where to hit who on the head with a hammer to make them stop doing some specific stupid shit, I could develop an algorithm to support my new science of Corrective Phrenology*. And if it had any chance of working on the RIAA types, I would.
(* For those who missed the first week of Psychology 101, phrenology is the discredited pseudo-science of predicting personality and mental disorders according to the minor variations in head/skull shape; bumps.)
[If you find any spelling errors, it doesn't mean I don't care about what I write. It means I don't care what you think about it.]
US Gov't Agency Linux Desktops?
on
Linux in 2004?
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Terpstra says 'I predict that during 2004 at least one significant USA government body will adopt Linux on the desktop.'
Not with Homeland Security showing how absolutely retarded they insist on being and going with WinXX. This is clearly not a security based decision, and any "significant" attempt to go counter to it will bring the HLS pseudo-spooks down by the thousands to protect their investments ^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H The Nation.
michael sez: 'Depending on how you define "significant", this has already occurred.'
Pray tell, what agency might that be? In my years inside the beltway (up through less than 2 months ago) I didn't see any with any appreciable (let's define that as, say 5%) Linux desktops on desks. All I've seen, besides individuals setting up their own for number crunching, is piles and miles of MS systems "supported" by clue-deficient federal employess constantly in fear of replacement by contractors for extremely good reasons. Even NIH was mostly MS on the desks, and what wasn't was Macs. The necessarily more powerful research machines we used were often *nix, but these were not desktop machines.
Offering a secured version of Linux for D/L is not the same as an agency's internal deployment of same.
"'Modern Day Gamer 2' is to ask whether we will ever see gaming become a mainstream spectator sport."
We most certainly will. Some would find watching others play excrutiatingly boring and frustrating, rather like watching someone typing a chat in IRC. But I'm certain there will be some who'll find it equal to watching "live" sports. That fact happens to disgust me no end.
Believe me, this is not a troll. I just happen to think that far too many people are on a downward spiral away from living in reality, and prefering the safety of the artificial, and I don't see this getting any better any time soon.
So, yes, I can see something like ESPN-G, the Gaming Channel.
How can the entertainment industry possibly move to a charge-per-piece pricing structure when someplace like MP3.com offers so much for cheap or free? You don't seriously think this was done to just obtain the domain name or the software they run the thing with? Wiping out the access to the cheap music is of at least equal import to them.
On a positive note, there's a good alternative for indie musicians at Magnatunes (http://magnatunes.com/). They offer pretty much what MP3.com did, plus help in licensing for things like movie scores, etc.
On a negative note, Magnatunes may be next in their sights.
Under "Definitions", "Initiate" includes "or procure the origination or transmission".... A more commonly used phrase is "cause to be sent".
Under "Sender", it includes the party offering the product, service, etc.
Put these together, and this means you don't have to go after the spammer. You can go after the party being advertised. Spammers are hard to find. Businesses CAN'T be hard to find, or they can't do business.
Sue enough of the busineses and word will get around: "Don't use spammers."
Hopefully "harvesting" can be stretched to include usenet.
"I'll get you!" "Don't hate me." Irrational expectations of others feelings regarding his behavior. Schizoid.
"The little guys are all out to get me." Paranoid.
Paranoid schizophrenia. I've said so before.
A corporation is a legal entity and should be held responsible for its actions to the same extent as persons. The more society is overrun with these virtual entities, the more important it becomes to mark their behavior acceptable or unacceptable to society. This is clinical sociology.
As for McBride's major part in things, there's nothing a little corrective phrenology wouldn't fix.
An factoid not mentioned in the original...
on
SCO News Roundup
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
... or elsewhere, as far as I can see, is McBride's announcement of plans to identify a large Linux end user and sue them if they don't pay the licensing fee within the next 90 days (http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle. jhtml?articleID=16101193).
~~~ thoughts ~~~
They'll sue an unnamed defendant for violating an unidentified intellectual property. Or so they say. The mouse realizes its roar isn't much of one?
IANAL, but I have worked with an FBI agent with respect to online communicaitons. His take: A threat is considered an assault in every state. A threat of legal action in no way makes the threat legal. If phrased in terms of "If you do/do not X, then I will Y" it's extortion. If transmitted via the net, or by phone and can shown to be transmitted in part between different states, it's extortion by wire, interstate, and is a federal offence.
I hope someone out there is watching what SCO does and is planning on going after their methods, other than those named by SCO as targets. Otherwise the only people claiming SCO was doing something wrong in the process of carrying out their tirade will be those defending themselves from it. That won't carry near as much weight.
AT&T developed something. That cost them money. It cost them very little more to patent it. Patented, it's protected: if anyone uses it for anything, no matter who or what, AT&T stands to make money and recover development costs.
That's all just a Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious. Why must everyone assume more? I can't see AT&T doing it for any other reason than for its own sake. I doubt the decision to file a patent had anything to do with the content. I doubt they care what it can be used for, other than generating income.
I'd like to be wrong. But then I'd also like to propose a new oxymoron: "altruistic corporation".
Reziac sez: "Such problems can wind up being very convenient to M$'s interests, and I'm sure are subsequently exploited by said interests, but aren't *necessarily* intentional in origin."
How many such instances does it take in order for the probability to swing from "unintentional" to "plausible deniability masked as incompetence"?
How many such instances have there been since Gates first tried selling BASIC on paper tape to the Homebrew Computer Club at SLAC?
To test for intentionality, compare how many of these "accidents" were beneficial, as opposed to detrimental, to M$. Keep in mind that detrimental to a consumer is not necessarily detrimental to M$; a frequently crashing OS is a powerful motivation to purchase an upgrade.
Slashdot Mirror
... is access to ITER while conducting experiments on neutron capture to produce fissionables, including weapons grade. France is likely to scream bloody murder sooner or later when the US does this (because they can; because they want to world to see them supporting non-weapons based nuclear work; because they want to be seen standing up to the World Bully; because it could encroach on their own high neutron producing commercial reactor business; etc.). While the people of Japan are equally as likely to find displeasure in what amounts to nuclear weapons research being conducted on their soil, the Japanese government and social structure will keep the noise level much lower than would occur in France. The US could get booted from France (it happened to NATO), but not from Japan.
d f). If the US were interested in energy production, rather than neutron production, they could have pursued thorium based fission reactors (http://www.americanscientist.org/template/AssetDe tail/assetid/25710/page/2). They're not as clean as fusion, but cleaner than heavy uranium and plutonium reactors. They're not externally neutron efficient, because they use their neutrons "breeding" thorium 232 into uranium 233, the actual fuel for the reaction. Thorium reactors can be built as neutron sources, but that's hanging a bag on the design; the more efficient designs don't need or incorporate that because they use the neutrons themselves.
Although fusion is relatively "clean", ITER is still a neutron heavy design (http://wsx.lanl.gov/Publications/neut-activate.p
"Solar radiation is measured by seeing how much the side of a black plate warms up when exposed to the sun, compared with its flip side, which is shaded. It's a relatively crude device, and we have no way of proving how accurate measurements made 30 years ago really are. "To detect temporal changes you must have very good data otherwise you're just analysing the difference between data retrieval systems," says Ohmura."
Measurement is data COLLECTION, not RETRIEVAL.
Does this bonehead seriously believe there's some sort of magical barrier between different forms of data collection?
1. Set up both old and new devices and take measurements. Compare results. If there's a systematic difference, apply the approriate correction factor to the old data, OR
2. USE THE OLD DEVICE.
The former is what any decent scientist would do when confronted with new technology, without waiting for some situation to occur which would call his measurements into question. The latter is always possible by going to the undergraduate labs and taking back the old stuff you've given them to learn with. If the old stuff isn't available any more, have the undergrads build some. They'd learn more from that than from using your old junk anyway.
thoolihan sez: "Technology could have solved this problem a better way."
If it could have, it would have. We've had the technology all along. Nothing tried worked, and many things considered were not even tried because it was obvious they wouldn't work either.
The problem is not technical, it's social. It requires a social solution. However, this law is not it.
One silver lining to this law though: it requires a valid, working opt-out address. When the flood of opt-out message blow the server off the net, that address will no longer be working, and the spammer will be in violation.
Remember, kids, opt-out early, and opt-out often. If it doesn't work, scream bloody murder. As weak as it is, this law gives you a voice. Use it. When it fails miserably, then maybe we'll get a better law.
...could be had by examining the pages for a year's worth of Wired, and at the end of the year, trying to find those things in a store. Wired has made a bad habit of advertising vaporware for companies that want to test the market and see how many inquiries they get. Of course, Wired never comes out and tells you such-and-such isn't really being made and sold. They write them all up as if they exist. You'd think that'd be strange behavior for a magazine that carries an annual vaporware contest, but hey, it's Wired. They only have to be cool, not sensical.
Looks like SUn is pushing for exactly this. On Monday they announce a deal with the UK government to supply Linux Enterprise servers and Java Desktop Linux users' systems.
AND, they're announcing a deal with the Chinese software consortium CSSC, which could amount to from 0.5 to 1.0 million desktops a year.
With support now for OO, and with their Java Desktop + Suse Linux (Due out Dec. 12) coming with tech support (including "migration support")they might JUST have a combination that can best M$, and actually compete for the average user's desktop. That is, if the initial install is at least as easy as Windows. I'll let you know next week.
This joke about a joke was told to me by a social psychologist who specializes in the psychology of humor.
The traveling salesman's car breaks down at night on a country road. He walks to the nearest farm, knocks on the door says "May car broke down. Can you give me a ride into town?"
The farmer says "Not tonight, but I can take you in the morning. You can stay in my guest house. No one else is there. You can lock the doors, and no one will bother you, guaranteed."
The salesman turns around and starts to walk away. The farmer says "Hey! Where are you going?"
The salesman says "Sorry, wrong joke."
I've tested this one in a stand-up routine. The average Joe/Jane rarely gets it. Anyone who knows lab-working scientists gets it right away.
A famous scientist was downtown, shopping with his wife, and clearly not enjoying it. She said "I'm going to shop for some shoes. You can go to the bookstore to browse. I'll meet you in front of the bookstore in an hour," and goes off.
The scientist goes into the bookstore. Soon after, a beautiful young coed comes in, eyes the scientist, and starts to make moves on him. He falls for the ploy, and ends up at her place, doing the nasty.
Three hours later, he realizes he's late, and rushes off back to the bookstore. There he finds his wife waiting, arms crossed, tapping her toe angrily.
Overcome with remorse he tells her what happened, admitting everything, and apologizing profusely.
She listens to his speech, and when he's done, shakes her finger at him and yells "Don't lie to me! You were at the lab!"
As noted elsewhere, nobody, including Bill Gates, ever said anything about 640K being enough.
The source of the quote was Steve Jobs, questioning Steve Wozniak's suggestion to build the "Language Card", the 16K memory card that took the Apple II/II Plus from 48K to 64K.
Jobs' actual words were, "Why would anyone ever need more than 48K?" Not 64K, as assumed by the first misquoters, based on the maximum direct addressability of 8 bit processors, and not 640K as assumed by those who decided to misattribute the quote altogether.
Jobs was always questioning Woz's technically oriented decisions, and frequently making the opposite decision when he had the power to do so. For example, he argued that there was no reason to build color into the Apple II. Woz did it anyway. When Jobs got the chance to make a similar decision, he went against Woz's reasoning, and even against the advice of others under him when making them. Hence, the original Macs, and several versions after, were strictly monochrome.
I'd like to think Jobs learned his lesson after ignoring someone's advice not to hire "some soda pop selling suit" and losing control of his company for 10 years. But I could be wrong.
Anyway, that's what I recall from my old "SoftTalk" and "The Road Apple" days.
On their own ranking scale:
...they score an average of exactly 2.5 on their support. I'm not impressed.
.05 (accepting a 5% chance any given result is a false positive), they have a cumulative probability of 93% that at least one of their "4" scores is incorrect.
"How the Scale Is Defined
Score Meaning of the number of bullets
5 bullets -- Two or more Category A Experiments (Hypothesis Testing) support the guideline.
4 bullets -- One Category A Experiment (Hypothesis Testing) supports the guideline.
3 bullets* -- Two or more Category B Studies (Observational Evaluation/ Performance-Based Usability Tests) support the guideline.
2 bullets* -- One Category B Study (Observational Evaluation/ Performance-Based Usability Tests) supports the guideline.
1 bullet* -- One or more Category C Observations (Expert/Opinions), and no other supporting evidence, supports the guideline.
0 bullets** -- No evidence supports the guideline. The guideline may be routinely implemented in many Web sites as standard practice without any supporting evidence."
Furthermore, they have zero scores of 5; not a one of their "experiments" was replicated. And they have 14 scores of 4. If success were considered the traditional statistical significance value of p
Finally, out of 150 measures, they have 11 scores of "1", meaning "expert opinion". Without a way to tell whether these opinions might be biased by something like potential gain from a commercial publication on the subject, these would be all useless. However, they do provide such evidence. Many of these "opinions" are from published books, for which the author no doubt gets paid. While the author may indeed be an expert, and his/her opinion very probably good and correct, these data are potentially biased to the point that they are NOT EVIDENCE.
This sort of nonsense is what Samuel Clemens was talking about when he said "Lies, damn lies, and statistics".
I suppose the discussion here could have taken the path of "the natural evolution of language", which usually completely fails to conform to any particular set of lingustic rules. In fact such evolution may only be visible *because* it violates the rules.
Instead, everyone seems to intend to stick to the traditional line (and be aware this selfsame argument is over 20 years old) and base their positions on Appleal to Authority. In terms of logic, this is a flaw. In terms of argumentation, it's a constant. It invariably results in people appealing to dictionaries, as though they were prescriptive. They're not: they're descriptive. They tell only how people use language, not how they *should* use it. (OK, some do that, but mostly to satisfy elementary school grammar teachers, who are entirely wrong when it comes to this). At least none I've seen appealed to "Websters'", which is a marketing label in and of itself in no way any more authoritative than Uncle Bubba's Down Home Dictionary, Almanac and Sporting Goods Catalog.
So here's my contribution: I've contacted Fred COhen, author of the 1983 virus paper, and asked his opinion. Here's his response, Date: Fri, 28 Nov 2003 09:57:13 -0800 (PST):
"I think that this discussion was held at great length in the late 1980s. "viruses" is of course an acceptable spelling and legitimate according
to most dictionaries, while "virii" is another less used but perfectly acceptable plural form as far as I am aware. The quesiton of which is
preferred is a matter of public opinion rather than scientific reconning."
Now, I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt, and credit him with using "reconning" (as as slang verb form of "reconnaissance", meaning observation) as an accurate as well as homonymous replacement for "reckoning" (i.e., "figuring out"). After all, if it's "scientific", it's more reconning than reckoning.
I've also asked Rick Skrenta, author of the Apple II Elk Cloner virus, which predates Cohen's paper by over a year, the same question. If he answers, I'll add it.
I absolutely do not expect this all to slow the endless and circular arguments regarding "virii" one iota. But at least I've given you something to think about, and at least put a little effort into adding something new. Speaking of, here's something else:
Despite the media effusion concerning the 20th anniversary of his paper, Cohen says that only one other party contacted him in regards to the subject. Had they done so, they might have learned that although Cohen now resides and teaches at the University of California-San Francisco, he still teaches computer forensics at the University of New Haven (where he was when he wrote the paper) via "distance teaching".
It covers precisely the range and points that were widely accepted by the end of the conference. And yes, that means it ended poorly.
A few of us tried to make the point that filtering done at the receiving end does nothing to stop the wasted bandwidth. Furthermore, carrying that extra bandwidth, whether a given user ever sees it or not, means greater equipment purchase, maintanence and replacement costs, and those costs are passed along to the consumer.
Unfortunately even some of the supposedly anti-spam community got suckered into accepting "labeling" and "the false positive problem" and other nonsense. I think they were trying to be fair to the few truly ethical online marketing folks, but in so doing forgot to consider the actual numbers related to the issues, and lost track of perspective.
My hero of the conference was Commisioner Swindell, the older ex-Marine gentleman who found himself seperating a spammer's lawyer and his intended target it a near brawl. I spoke with him, and he was one of the few there who maintained the recognition that the problem is far greater than the stuff that annoys people when they find it in their inbox; an equal problem is that part of their bill due to spam whether they receive it nor not.
A suitable response to this law would be for everyone (in the US at least) to forward any spam they receive to the inboxes of the boneheads who initiated and supported this law, with the statement "IT AIN'T WORKING!"
"Nuke 'em from orbit. It's the only way to be sure." -- Lt. Ripley
I've been thinking a lot about widespread Linux desktop installations lately. I almost posted an Ask Slashdot about it yesterday.
You want to see widespread Linux desktop installation? "Which desktop" is precisely the wrong kind of question to be asking. That information is superfluous to both the IT droids who'll have to support it, and the cubical dwellers who'll have to live with it.
To get ANY Linux out there in significant numbers, you need to best Microsoft. The system would need to restrict itself to asking and giving what Microsoft does now. All the distros I've tried give way too much choice. Choice is great from hackers. It's pure terror in the form of tough questions for the MSmasses.
Install easy, with a minimum of user input. Give what Windows does: desktop, "office" suite, email, web, and hidden below the surface unless needed, the ability to run server or client based specialty software in a window that looks and acts like all the others.
It'd need to automagically recognize any networking being offered it and configure itself to that. When it did ask questions, they should be "What is your internet address going to be? (This is a collection of up to 12 numbers with periods between them; if you don't know, ask your system operator)", NOT "Input your IP dotted quad".
Users don't WANT to know how cool it is, much less which of the possible configurations is cooler. They want transparent instant operability. They couldn't care less if their desktop were the black, lavender and orange Star Trek LCARS screen, as long as they can do their job and not have to readjust to a new configuration of they switch seats or machines.
Give them that, for less than MS, say $100 per machine INCLUDING phone tech support (something like Sun is planning with its Java Desktop plus presumably Suse), and it'll look as inviting as MS.
Make it more stable, and easier to recover from crashes (no more "Well, we'll just have to reinstall the operating system") and it'll be more inviting than MS.
Send out 10,000 of them free to the top companies' IT people, invite them to install it and try it out on some unclued cubical dwellers machines, and wait for the results. After enough time has passed, contact those companies CIO and ask how well it worked, and if they'd like to buy. They'll ask the IT people, and your answer will be assured if the distro was done right.
Oh yeah, and make it be not bloatware, and use that as a selling point. For an example, see muLinux, the distro that fits (and RUNS) on 5 floppies. A complete install, including all docs and archives of the install files, took 30 MB on my machine. Oh yeah, it had a GUI. I don't recall which. I didn't care then, and I don't now, because all I cared about was whether it worked or not. It did.
MS software is obviously not better than Linux. Something else about MS must be. Find it, and best them. Even if that means turning your favorite distro into Linux for Dummies, because it's dummies who sit behind most of the machines out there.
And if it's still a concern that a given distro/desktop would still require more maintanence, because the dummy in front of it can't do squat, then your distro/desktop is not ready for Cubical Heaven/Hell Prime Time. The successful (as in widely deployed) Linux desktop user system will be the one that decides "OK, that's enough hacking. It's time to go to work."
"True artists ship." -- Steve Jobs to the original Mac design team.
drsmithy sez: "Can any of you USians tell me why you don't use the word "spat" ?"
That which is "correct" is often viewed as "old fashioned", and that is anathema to what passes for culture in American society. We know full well "spat" is correct: that's why.
And then he sez: "(And while you're at it, could you tell me why you say "petting the cat" instead of "patting the cat".)"
We use both.
petting == stroking; parallel to surface
patting == tapping; perpendicual to surface
But cats are most often stroked, not tapped, hence the seeming propensity of "petting".
I am well aware that I have a hooter in my bonnet. Unfortunately, when I say that in American, it means I have a tit under my hat, rather than a horn under the hood of my car. I'm not quite sure exactly what point that makes, but it makes me laugh like hell.
Viva la different stuff.
"Well, golly, Mr. ARIA, I guess we could do that. But you see, it'd take an awful lot of people watching what happens, and a lot of computers and software for them to do their jobs. That's going to run into a lot of money. So what say we ask the government to help us get this paid for? We'll was them to pass a bill for a new tax. Since it's to protect music, it just makes sense that it's a tax on music. We figure of you charge, say, 40% on top of the cost of a CD, that should cover it. You pass that along to us, and we'll do our best.
Mr. ARIA? Where you going? Mr. ARIA, don't you want to catch all them bad song stealing people out there?
fb4f sez: 'Paraphrasing the article, a Spanish company called Polyphonic HMI has made a business out of analyzing song submissions and predicting their "hitability".'
Figure: Despite the fact that subliminal advertising is 99% bogus, and Freud's thanatos theory is 101% bogus, alcohol and tobacco companies have been using the combination of the two, in the form of death imagery airbrushed into their ads, for over 30 years. They have no evidence it works, but JUST IN CASE they can grab another tenth of percentage point of market share, they keep paying artists thousands of dollars to do this.
The same will apply here. Record publishers will pay money just in case they can make more money, no matter how ridiculous the premise.
This algorithm could actually produce enough positives to convince people it works, if there were sufficient sampling of the population on what it is they like about a sufficient sampling of songs.
It will, however, produce a lot of false negatives when its tried on those songs which don't fit the pop definitions. Songs like "Luftballoon" and "The Music Box Song" were pop hits because they were almost meme-like catchy. Johnny Cash's "Boy Named Sue" was a pop hit despite being based in country rather than pop. And, the algorithm will completely miss anything truly innovative. There would be lots of false negatives, and of course as negatives they'd be unlikely to be reviewed later as evidence the proces was broken. There would probably be very few false positives, and that too would appear to support the algorithm (beacuse people trying to maximize income are highly unlikely to grasp the statistical concepts of alpha level, beta level, and power).
And perhaps this could be a good thing. If the RIAA crowd started relying on such Artificial Stupidity (what else can you call something that picks the winners that these losers sell), then the truly innovative will be forced to operate under a different paradigm. Maybe something like MP3.com/Magnatunes, etc. Maybe self-produced and distributed via the net, bypasing the record companies altogether. Maybe becoming the seed of an as yet unthought of social art system that will fill the gap when the RIAA finally eats itself.
On the other hand, given sufficient sampling of the population, and where to hit who on the head with a hammer to make them stop doing some specific stupid shit, I could develop an algorithm to support my new science of Corrective Phrenology*. And if it had any chance of working on the RIAA types, I would.
(* For those who missed the first week of Psychology 101, phrenology is the discredited pseudo-science of predicting personality and mental disorders according to the minor variations in head/skull shape; bumps.)
[If you find any spelling errors, it doesn't mean I don't care about what I write. It means I don't care what you think about it.]
Terpstra says 'I predict that during 2004 at least one significant USA government body will adopt Linux on the desktop.'
Not with Homeland Security showing how absolutely retarded they insist on being and going with WinXX. This is clearly not a security based decision, and any "significant" attempt to go counter to it will bring the HLS pseudo-spooks down by the thousands to protect their investments ^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H The Nation.
michael sez: 'Depending on how you define "significant", this has already occurred.'
Pray tell, what agency might that be? In my years inside the beltway (up through less than 2 months ago) I didn't see any with any appreciable (let's define that as, say 5%) Linux desktops on desks. All I've seen, besides individuals setting up their own for number crunching, is piles and miles of MS systems "supported" by clue-deficient federal employess constantly in fear of replacement by contractors for extremely good reasons. Even NIH was mostly MS on the desks, and what wasn't was Macs. The necessarily more powerful research machines we used were often *nix, but these were not desktop machines.
Offering a secured version of Linux for D/L is not the same as an agency's internal deployment of same.
"'Modern Day Gamer 2' is to ask whether we will ever see gaming become a mainstream spectator sport."
We most certainly will. Some would find watching others play excrutiatingly boring and frustrating, rather like watching someone typing a chat in IRC. But I'm certain there will be some who'll find it equal to watching "live" sports. That fact happens to disgust me no end.
Believe me, this is not a troll. I just happen to think that far too many people are on a downward spiral away from living in reality, and prefering the safety of the artificial, and I don't see this getting any better any time soon.
So, yes, I can see something like ESPN-G, the Gaming Channel.
"They HAVE to kill us."
How can the entertainment industry possibly move to a charge-per-piece pricing structure when someplace like MP3.com offers so much for cheap or free? You don't seriously think this was done to just obtain the domain name or the software they run the thing with? Wiping out the access to the cheap music is of at least equal import to them.
On a positive note, there's a good alternative for indie musicians at Magnatunes (http://magnatunes.com/). They offer pretty much what MP3.com did, plus help in licensing for things like movie scores, etc.
On a negative note, Magnatunes may be next in their sights.
Anonymous Coward sez: "Still the best. Use it up to this day."
Same here. 4 MB RAM, 7.5 MHz, 100 MB internal drive, 30 MB of which is dedicated to the '286 clone transputer running MS-DOS 3.3
Hasn't crashed since 1990. The internal calendar goes to 2040, and I believe it.
Under "Definitions", "Initiate" includes "or procure the origination or transmission".... A more commonly used phrase is "cause to be sent".
Under "Sender", it includes the party offering the product, service, etc.
Put these together, and this means you don't have to go after the spammer. You can go after the party being advertised. Spammers are hard to find. Businesses CAN'T be hard to find, or they can't do business.
Sue enough of the busineses and word will get around: "Don't use spammers."
Hopefully "harvesting" can be stretched to include usenet.
"I'll get you!" "Don't hate me."
Irrational expectations of others feelings regarding his behavior. Schizoid.
"The little guys are all out to get me." Paranoid.
Paranoid schizophrenia. I've said so before.
A corporation is a legal entity and should be held responsible for its actions to the same extent as persons. The more society is overrun with these virtual entities, the more important it becomes to mark their behavior acceptable or unacceptable to society. This is clinical sociology.
As for McBride's major part in things, there's nothing a little corrective phrenology wouldn't fix.
... or elsewhere, as far as I can see, is McBride's announcement of plans to identify a large Linux end user and sue them if they don't pay the licensing fee within the next 90 days (http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle. jhtml?articleID=16101193).
~~~ thoughts ~~~
They'll sue an unnamed defendant for violating an unidentified intellectual property. Or so they say. The mouse realizes its roar isn't much of one?
IANAL, but I have worked with an FBI agent with respect to online communicaitons. His take:
A threat is considered an assault in every state.
A threat of legal action in no way makes the threat legal.
If phrased in terms of "If you do/do not X, then I will Y" it's extortion.
If transmitted via the net, or by phone and can shown to be transmitted in part between different states, it's extortion by wire, interstate, and is a federal offence.
I hope someone out there is watching what SCO does and is planning on going after their methods, other than those named by SCO as targets. Otherwise the only people claiming SCO was doing something wrong in the process of carrying out their tirade will be those defending themselves from it. That won't carry near as much weight.
... and forget "FOR" or "AGAINST".
AT&T developed something. That cost them money. It cost them very little more to patent it. Patented, it's protected: if anyone uses it for anything, no matter who or what, AT&T stands to make money and recover development costs.
That's all just a Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious. Why must everyone assume more? I can't see AT&T doing it for any other reason than for its own sake. I doubt the decision to file a patent had anything to do with the content. I doubt they care what it can be used for, other than generating income.
I'd like to be wrong. But then I'd also like to propose a new oxymoron: "altruistic corporation".
Reziac sez: "Such problems can wind up being very convenient to M$'s interests, and I'm sure are subsequently exploited by said interests, but aren't *necessarily* intentional in origin."
How many such instances does it take in order for the probability to swing from "unintentional" to "plausible deniability masked as incompetence"?
How many such instances have there been since Gates first tried selling BASIC on paper tape to the Homebrew Computer Club at SLAC?
To test for intentionality, compare how many of these "accidents" were beneficial, as opposed to detrimental, to M$. Keep in mind that detrimental to a consumer is not necessarily detrimental to M$; a frequently crashing OS is a powerful motivation to purchase an upgrade.